Title Insurance Building To Undergo Creative Office Conversion

Downtown’s Title Insurance and Trust building is getting a creative makeover.

Spearheaded by the L.A.-based development firm Rising Realty Partners, the iconic and currently vacant Art Deco structure will undergo a $40 million renovation to become creative offices.

Rising Realty bought the structure in conjunction with Lionstone Investments and Industry Partners last week, though what they paid has not yet been disclosed.

For the 11-story building at 433 South Spring Street, developers are planning to create about 300,000 square feet of offices, most of which will have open floor plans. The ground floor would have retail space and the roof would house a restaurant. The facade will be updated, and lead and asbestos will be removed.

The imminent transformation of the Title Insurance building marks a shift in the historic core of Downtown Los Angeles, according to development consultant Hal Bastian.

The area was once a commercial hub — known as the Wall Street of the West — but fell to the wayside in the 1970s as businesses migrated to the suburbs. The shift now, Bastian told the L.A. Times, is catalyzed by the past two decades’ residential conversions that have emerged along Main Street, Spring Street and Broadway.

“It’s coming full circle,” he said.

Houston-based Lionstone, Santa Monica’s Industry Partners and Rising Realty have collaborated before: The group worked to convert the PacMutual Center at 6th and Olive Streets into offices.

Nearby, another DTLA Art Deco classic is getting a makeover. Hotel Cecil at 640 South Main Street, is gearing up to become a residential complex of 301 micro-apartments, courtesy of New York City-based co-living company Ollie.